Everyone has heard about the 4 P’s of marketing (or up to 8 now depending on where your thinking lies) but I think a good place to begin building your marketing plan is with the 4 E’s of marketing. For many businesses, trying to put together a marketing plan of activity, there are 4 very simple steps that you can use as a guide.
Number 1: Elevator Pitch
If you don’t have one, it’s going to be difficult to explain to anyone what your business is trying to achieve. An elevator pitch is basically a 30 second description that explains what your company does, in a way that any listener can understand, in that short period of time. If you can’t clearly explain, in that time, what you are doing then you need to try to get your thinking clear. Otherwise it will be increasingly difficult to communicate your intention.
What an elevator pitch is trying to do is to simply explain the benefit of your company in an enticing yet concise way. The objective is to engage with the potential customer and entice them to learn more. It is not a sales pitch! An elevator pitch is not designed to convince the person who hears it to purchase but to earn you a potential lead or the chance of a second conversation.
It is a really good idea to have a well-thought out and constructed elevator pitch that you can use when networking and building your business. The sentiment in it can be reflected on your website, social media channels and any other collatoral you use to promote your business. It is worth spending time getting it right.
Number 2: Email Marketing
With the growth in social media, email marketing can often get forgotten. Yet it is one of the most powerful and measurable ways of communicating with your customers. It is an excellent way to build loyalty, trust and brand awareness. As a customer retention tool, it is one of the most effective to attract, engage and connect with your audience to drive sales and revenue for your business.
Email marketing is also significantly cheaper and faster than traditional mail. It can drive leads directly to your website and provides excellent customer insights when recipient behaviour is analysed. The subject line is critical in email to encourage open rates and the content needs to be interesting and compelling to ensure engagement. The time and day of issue is also important to ensure you are reaching your audience when they are most likely to open the email.
Benchmarking and measuring the success of your emails and how to improve them is detailed in this guide.
Number 3: Electronic Tools
The tools you use to promote your business are critical to your success. In our increasingly digital age these are, of course, in the main electronic tools. First up is a website. No matter what your business, a website is a key tool to help people find out about you. It is basically your 24/7 shop window and should give the best first impression of your business that is possible. According to Google over 50% of shoppers say they always do research online before they buy to ensure they are making the best possible choice. In our current Covid-19 world, this figure has increased significantly as more and more people are online.
In addition to your website, you may wish to look at social media to help drive traffic to your site and raise the visibility of your business. Find out where your potential clients are and use those channels. Make sure you post on the optimum day and time to get in front of them. Be selective and try to use one or two channels well rather than spreading your time and effort too thin. Use social media to drive traffic back to your website so customers can get a broader picture of your offering.
Number 4: Effort and effectiveness
And finally make sure you see what effectiveness that all that effort has achieved. At outset put clear goals in place aligned to your business goals and ensure that you put measures in place to gauge their success. Are you trying to build your social media following, increase website visitor numbers or convert leads through an appointment booking tool? Whatever your goals are there is a way to measure them online. Digital marketing is a lot about analytics. It is very easy to track the success or not of content and campaigns, see what is or is not working and change it as necessary.
Now over to you! Begin with a few simple yet effective actions to start building your overall marketing plan and the rewards will be worth it. If you need any help or guidance on any aspect, from strategy to implementation or anything in between, just get in touch with us at Shortbytes Marketing Solutions.